Bulgaria finds more bird flu, expects deadly H5N1

Police block access to wetland areas, start shooting wild predators

By Kremena Miteva - Reuters

SOFIA - Bulgaria has detected another case of H5 bird flu, authorities said yesterday, and expects it and two other samples found in dead swans over the past two weeks to be the H5N1 strain that can kill humans.

The Balkan state announced on Saturday that the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain, which has killed at least 88 people and forced the culling of millions of birds in Asia and Turkey since 2003, had been found in Bulgaria for the first time.

The latest bird found with H5 was a swan near the Black Sea port of Burgas, some 3.5 kilometers (2 miles) from a farm with 120,000 egg-laying hens, Chief Veterinarian Zheko Baichev told journalists. He said his office would send samples to the EU-certified laboratory in Weybridge, England, for further analysis.

Agriculture Minister Nihat Kabil said that, following a spate of cases of the H5N1 strain across the region, he expected the latest Bulgarian samples to test positive for this strain. “We suppose, after all samples sent to Weybridge from Southeast Europe tested positive for H5N1, the other samples (from Bulgaria) that will be sent tomorrow will, with very high probability, also test positive for H5N1,” he said.

Authorities are also awaiting results from two other H5-infected swans found dead near the Black Sea coast and have started preliminary tests on at least nine more swans, two ducks and a cormorant found dead across the country since last week.

Police have blocked access to wetland areas and begun to shoot wild predators to prevent them from spreading the remains of potentially contaminated birds. They also plan to post signs in high-risk areas warning: “Danger of bird flu.”

The discovery of H5N1 in the country is a blow to its already reeling poultry industry, which produces around 9 percent of the foie gras consumed in Europe, and Kabil said he feared it was only a matter of time before H5N1 appeared in domestic poultry. “It is not necessary to start culling domestic birds... (but) we have to accept the thought that in the coming days we might have the first outbreak,” he said.

BUCHAREST (AFP) - Authorities confirmed yesterday the H5 strain of bird flu was found in Topraisar in the southeast of the country, making it the 29th village in Romania to be hit by the virus.

“Samples taken from birds that were found dead will be sent to the British laboratory in Weybridge for further tests to confirm the presence of the H5N1 virus,” Grigore Mertoiu, of the local veterinary health administration, said yesterday.

Yesterday morning, local authorities began culling about 30,000 birds in the region. Residents will also be vaccinated against the common flu, Mertoiu told AFP. Topraisar has been put under quarantine and disinfection filters have been placed at the entrances to the village, authorities said.